


Favorite Color is Blue

by samielissabeth



Series: Favorite Color [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Cutting, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, F/M, High School, High School AU, Implied/Reference Rape/Non-Con, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Kidnapping, M/M, Past Rape/Non-con, Past Sexual Abuse, Past physical abuse, Physical Abuse, Rape/Non-con Elements, Self-Harm, Sexual Abuse, past emotional/psychological abuse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-06
Updated: 2018-08-01
Packaged: 2019-05-18 22:57:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,182
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14861909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/samielissabeth/pseuds/samielissabeth
Summary: It was a succession of images, though in one of them, a taller boy, closer to Keith’s age appeared. He was walking to meet the two younger kids. Keith sucked in his breath as he began to flip through the images. The teenage boy Keith now really recognizes as Lance, his skin darkened from days out in the sun. His hair had begun the process of air drying, slight curls forming at the nape of his neck and at his temples. When the younger kids, presumably his siblings, ran up to him, the little boy threw the water on him. Lance smiled, and in a sequence of photos, Keith could tell Lance was laughing. One image showed him picking up his younger sister. All things considered, this had been the moment Keith noticed his heart (both when he took the pictures and in class that day) racing.





	1. Something Blue

**Author's Note:**

> Hey everyone, this fic is part one of a three part series called "Favorite Color." I have to thank my good friend Lily for helping me spitball ideas/validate the possibility of certain things and edit most of the chapters. Thanks! I will try and be as conscious as possible about anything that could be triggering and put warnings up, so I'll put the line it starts and the line it stops in the notes before the chapter. I hope you guys enjoy this!

Lance wasn’t  _always_  late, but it had become a habit in the past year at school. He didn’t even live far from school, so he could never really use traffic as an excuse for his tardiness, unless you counted the chaos in the two bathrooms in his house at 7:00 in the morning as traffic. His alarm went off on time, he just didn’t get up when it did. He snoozed it once, slamming his hand on the alarm clock he’d had since freshman year. When it went off a second time, seeming to get louder with each buzz, he groaned and shut it off, sitting up in his bed. Lance didn’t even check to see what time it was, he just made his way over to his dresser and searched for a clean shirt.

Wishing he had a more diverse closet, Lance pulled out a light blue t-shirt with dark blue trim. He reached down next to him on the floor for the pair of jeans he wore the day before.  _No reason I can’t wear these again. I only wore them once_. Lance thought as he grabbed a fresh pair of underwear from the second dresser drawer. Clothes in hand, he left his room.

“Good to see you’re awake, Lance,” his older brother, Luis said with a smile as Lance crossed the hall to face the closed bathroom door.

“Good to see you’re still alive, Luis,” Lance laughed to himself. He banged on the bathroom door, he didn’t have time to waste this morning. Luis punched his shoulder playfully.

“What do you want, Lance?” Maddison yelled at him. “I’m busy straightening my hair, can’t you wait?”

Lance rolled his eyes. “Actually, Maddy, I can’t. I have half an hour to get ready. “ He let his head bang on the bathroom door in preemptive defeat, knowing that Maddy wouldn’t get out of the bathroom anytime soon.

“Well, I have to get my hair straightened before everyone else is up. If I don’t have it done by then it will never be done!”

“Maddy, you don’t have to be at school until 9:15.  _9:15_  Maddy. You have almost two whole hours to get ready. I have thirty minutes.” Lance said. Sleep tried to pull him back as he leaned against the door. “Literally all I have to do is shower, please just let me in.”

The door disappeared underneath him, and Lance struggled not to fall face first on the tile bathroom floor. Maddy stood in the bathroom, one hand on her hip and the other holding a scalding hot straightener. Only half her hair was straight, the other half left a frizzy mess.

Maddy scanned a startled Lance for a moment with incriminating brown eyes. “You have ten minutes.” She scoffed. She unplugged her straightener and set it down on the counter.

“You have ten minutes,” Lance mocked. Maddy punched his shoulder and he laughed. They traded places, Maddy now in standing in the hallway with crossed arms and Lance in the bathroom, setting down his clothes for the day in the sink.

“I’m setting a timer, Lance!” Maddy threatened to set timers for Lance more often than not, but she never did. The slight laugh she let out told Lance she wasn’t going to this morning either. He was grateful that his sister cared enough to actually let him have the bathroom. Had it been Veronica it would’ve been a different story.

Lance turned on the shower water to let it heat up and then began to take off his pajamas. He didn’t bother looking himself over in the mirror as he pulled off his shirt and underwear. He knew what would just be staring back at him, and he didn’t like it. It’s not that he didn’t like his body, he actually took pride in the runners body he had gotten from freshman and sophomore year on the track team. He just didn’t like certain aspects of his body.

As he stepped in the shower, he sucked in a breath. He pulled the curtain closed and immediately started washing his hair. The water ran down his back, not hot enough to sting but not cold enough to send a chill racing down his spine. Lance turned around and washed out as much of the shampoo as he could stand to before reaching for his conditioner.

“I don’t have enough time for this this morning,” he muttered, squeezing the bottle and working the conditioner through his hair. Lance let the conditioner sit, doing what was, unfortunately, a quick once over of his body with soap- he hated feeling dirty but he hated being late even more.

Someone knocked on the door as he was stepping out of the shower.

“Give me literally two seconds to find a towel and I’ll be out!” Lance scrambled to grab a towel out of the bathroom closet before the door was opened with reckless abandon by one of his siblings.

“Chill, Lance, I’m just letting you know it’s 7:15.” It was Veronica’s voice that came muffled through the door. Lance sighed in relief, knowing it wasn’t Maddy about to hurtle through the door. He dried his hair with the towel he grabbed, leaving it a spiky mess, and wrapped the same towel around his waist. Grabbing his clothes off the counter, he opened the door.

He was faced with Veronica, who in the past year or so, had seemed to get shorter, which really meant that Lance was just getting taller. He never seemed to stop growing, and the only person that matched him for height so far was his brother Marco. Veronica looked him over once before departing down the hall.

“Get ready quick, Lance, you’ll be late to school if you don’t leave soon.” She called over her shoulder.

“Could you start a pot of coffee?” Lance asked.

“Already did, nerd.” Lance smiled to himself, realizing that when he went to college that he would miss his sister always having things ready and under control, how she always had some sort of food prepared for anyone and everyone in the house to eat in the mornings, how she always reminded him of the time because he often was late.

Lance stood at his dresser for a moment, drying himself off before reaching for the t-shirt he had picked. He pulled it over his head, ruffling his hair more, and followed with underwear and jeans. Socks were next, and his shoes, he knew, sat by the front door, waiting to be put on.

What he was left struggling to do was find his homework, which typically wasn’t ever a problem. Despite his room being a complete mess, he knew where everything was. “Organized chaos,” as he often called it. Lance checked his desk, and none of his homework was where he’d left it, fallen asleep on it more like. He rummaged through his backpack which sat next to his bedroom door, thinking that maybe he had shoved it in there before he finally crawled into bed at 3:30. Lance zipped it up in a hurry before slinging it over his shoulder and racing into the kitchen. He checked the time on his phone.  _7:21._

“Shit,” Lance muttered to himself as he grabbed his jacket off the chair he abandoned it on last night.

“What was that, Lance?” Lance whipped around to see Luis leaning on the counter, his hands wrapped around a cup of coffee.

“I can’t find any of my homework, I stayed up too late working on it not to have it for school today.” Lance raked his hand through his damp hair and scanned the room. He pushed past Luis to grab his usual to go coffee cup and poured the cup 3/4 of the way, leaving just enough room for creamer. Luis clapped a hand on Lance’s back when he reached into the refrigerator.

“Johnny put it on the counter over there. He said you were passed out cold over it when he went in to say goodnight so he set it out before he went to bed.” Luis felt the tension in Lance’s shoulders leave as he explained their 10 year old brother’s act of chivalry.

Lance smiled and sighed a breath of relief when he secured the lid of his cup. “Remind me to thank Johnny when I get home.” Scooping up his homework from the counter that Johnny had so graciously set out, Lance ran for the door.

“Shoes!” Luis yelled after him.

“Right!” Lance leaned down at the front door and grabbed his red converse before heading out the door for school.

 

* * *

 

Lance was running to get to Madame Stewart’s class before the bell rang. She liked him, but not enough to let him into class late. He raced past Mrs. Dayton in the hallway and flashed her a smile, making her laugh. His coffee was threatening to spill, but Lance couldn’t afford to slow down. The mid bell had been ringing as he parked his car and the late bell had to be coming soon.

Lance spotted Keith walking leisurely into class as he burst through the music hallway doors.

“Hold the door, Keith!” Lance yelled. Keith startled, looking over his shoulder at the Cuban boy that Keith couldn’t quite call his friend, but couldn’t call a stranger either. Keith held the door, but more because he was too shocked to move than anything else. The bell rang just as Lance passed through the doorway. Madame Stewart gave Lance a sideways glance and smiled at him.

Lance’s hand found its way to Keith’s shoulder and he gave it a squeeze. “Thanks man,” Lance flashed a smile at Keith before making his way to the other side of the room to his seat, conveniently enough, next to where Keith sat.

Keith idled by the door, staring after Lance until Madame Stewart stood from her desk in the back of the class. For the life of him, Keith couldn’t remember a time when Lance had actually smiled at him. If there had been any, he could count them all on one hand. That didn’t mean, however, that he couldn’t consider Lance someone he liked.

“Bonjour, classe!” Madame Stewart said.

“Bonjour Madame.” Only a few students parroted the response.

“Oh, non, c’était très mauvais. J’ai dit, ‘Bonjour, classe!’”

A few more students piped up, which seemed to please Madame Stewart.

“Ça va?”

“Ça va,” Keith sat down as he said it and noticed Lance with his head down on his desk.

Madame said the last line of the scripted class greeting. “Quoi de neuf?”

“Pas grand chose.” Lance repeated what he had been saying since French 1 freshman year, but it came out muffled by his jacket. Keith stared at him for a moment before digging through his backpack for his French notebook.

“Ok, class, so today, we’re going to be doing work with l’imparfait, or the imperfect form of a verb.” Madame Stewart grabbed a marker and turned toward the white board. She began talking about l’imparfait and writing rules up on the board.

Keith leaned over to Lance and nudged his shoulder. “Dude, are you ok?” Lance responded with a groan, picking up his head slowly. He reached down into his backpack and pulled out a folder that Keith recognized as his French binder.

“I’m fine. Just tired is all.” Flipping to the page he left off on, Lance began to write. “Senior year started a bit over a month ago and I already want to graduate.” Lance laughed. “Hopefully I’ll make it to graduation.”

“What do you mean make it to graduation, you’re, like, number 10 in our class.” Keith said as he copied down the notes from the board.

“I’m just joking, Keith. I’m going to graduate. You know me, even when I’m slacking off I’m working on something.” Lance glanced up at the board and found himself totally lost, even though he’d been copying what Madame Stewart had been writing.

“Lance,” Madame Stewart called.

“Yes, Madame?”

“If I were to conjugate the verb ‘aller’ to say, ‘I used to go to the beach a lot during the summer,’ how would you say that?”

Heart pounding, Lance scanned the board, praying to see anything that would help him make sense of what he was supposed to learning. His eyes landed on a conjugation chart for a different verb, ‘avoir’ and he ran with what he saw.

“Uh, it would be ‘J’allais à la plage beaucoup en été,’ right?” Lance’s eyes darted to Madame Stewart and then back to the whiteboard.

“Oui, très bon, Lance.” Madame Stewart turned to the rest of the class and continued talking. While everyone else was writing, Keith turned to Lance, bewildered.

There was something about Lance that confused Keith, especially in the past few weeks in school together. Lance had been paying more attention to Keith recently, and he couldn’t put a finger on why. Keith watched Lance, seeing the tension in his body leave, knowing that he answers Madame’s question right.

Maybe it was because he was caught off guard by Madame’s question, or maybe it was because Lance was so prepared that being caught off guard that it didn’t matter. He could never seem to be wrong. Maybe he didn’t know what he was doing some of the time, but he always played it off like he knew exactly what was going on. Keith’s eyes were glued to Lance for a little while, trying to figure out what it was about this boy that was so captivating, but when Lance’s gaze even remotely turned in Keith’s direction, he made sure to look around the room and study the French classroom he had come to know and love over the past four years. Keith traced the outline of the various frames that scattered the walls of Madame Stewart’s room, each holding something different. His personal favorite was a picture depicting a little girl in a French market, reaching for a baguette. It fascinated him, making him wonder where the girl’s mother was, why she was just grabbing the baguette instead of paying or calling for her mother, questions that would never be answered.

Keith pulled himself from the questions that swarmed his mind just in time to hear Madame Stewart read out the textbook assignment they were to work on for the rest of class.

“You will be working in pairs to write a skit about things you used to do using the vocabulary from chapter six and the imperfect form. Partners will be with whoever sits across from you, so, starting on this side of the room, Lance and Keith-” Lance stopped listening when Madame Stewart said that he and Keith would be working together. His heart skipped a beat. There was nothing wrong with working with Keith. It was actually perfectly fine. It was just odd for Madame to assign partners. Usually they had free reign over who they worked with. Lance glanced over and Keith, who’s head had also perked up at the sound of assigned partners.

“I want to die,” Keith muttered under his breath. Lance didn’t know if it was because Keith had to work with him, or if it was because of the partner work in general.

“Come on, at least day it in French.”

“Je veux mourir.” Keith’s eyes bore into Lance when he turned his head that direction, causing Lance to bite his lip to hold back a laugh at the contempt in Keith’s voice.

Lance looked over Keith for a moment. Whether or not he was trying to look like he was from the 80s, Keith looked like he had just stepped out of a time machine. Keith had on what he had to assume wasn’t his jacket. The faded blue of the baseball bomber was more navy, and the formerly white sleeves were a cream color. Somebody’s red letter was on the front of the jacket, and it definitely wasn’t Keith’s because red was for varsity sports. He had on a plain white shirt underneath and his jeans were ripped up and down both legs. There had to be more holes than fabric. Lance’s gaze landed on Keith’s face, which at the moment was contorted in a rather angry expression.

“Lance!” Keith wasn’t yelling, but he may have well been. His eyebrows were furrowed in either anger or disapproval, maybe both, Lance couldn’t tell.

“Sorry, Keith,” Lance said, almost to himself.

Keith shoved his French notebook in Lance’s direction, laying his head down on his crossed arms when Lance took it from his hands. He kept his face towards Lance in case he had any questions.

“What’s this?”

“I already wrote my part of the script. Just fill in your parts and then we’ll be done.” Keith glanced at the clock across the room. “You might want to hurry though, class is almost over.” The time had flown by, Lance didn’t know how class could be almost over. It felt like mere minutes ago that he had yelled at Keith to hold open the door as the late bell rang out, loud and clear, and annoying most importantly.

Lance hadn’t noticed before, partly because he was never really paying attention, but Keith’s handwriting was pristine. It wasn’t the nicest handwriting Lance had ever seen, that award went to his brother Marco, but everything was so consistent-the spacing, the letters, the size of the words-that it seemed like a font that had been printed onto his notebook. Lance’s eyes skimmed quickly over what Keith had written, and it wasn’t a small amount. He started back at the beginning of Keith’s part of the script.

' _Quand j'avais neuf ans, ma famille et moi sommes allés camping. Nous avons conduit pour deux heures à la terrain de camping dans River Ranch en Floride. Mon père a conduit le campeur et quand nous sommes arrivés, ma mère l'a aidé le garer. Mon cousin, Shiro, était avec nous aussi. Shiro et moi metaient en place le terrain de camping pendant que mes parents ont préparé le campeur pour nous de dormir dans la nuit. Pour dîner, mon père et Shiro ont cuisiné des hamburgers. Après ça, Shiro m'a aidé à faire un feu et nous avons grillé des guimauves pour s'mores. Je suis resté debout très tard ce soir-là, mais mes parents n'étaient pas fâchés. Ma famille et moi passaient un très bon moment au camping._ ' Lance looked up from Keith’s notebook to look for any expression. His face, however, was devoid of any sort of emotion.

“Keith, did you make this up?” Keith perked up. “I mean, like, did you actually go camping with your family and Shiro?”

Keith nodded, stretching out as best he could in his seat. “Yeah, we used to go camping all the time when I was a little kid, but after my parents died back in 8th grade, Shiro and I haven’t really gone out much like that.” Keith rubbed the back of his neck with a tense hand, causing Lance’s eyes to shift from Keith’s face to the shaking fingers that twirled the ends of his hair. “We actually had a really good time, like, we drove down there and the entire time we were just goofing around, listening old songs on the radio, playing car games...” Keith’s voice trailed off as he got caught up in the memory of camping with his family.

“But it all stopped when my parents died. Shiro took me in after I got out of the hospital. He signed on as my legal guardian and I’ve lived with him ever since.” Lance was still staring at Keith, though Keith didn’t notice. “But everyone knows that. When you disappear for three weeks people talk about you and why you’re gone.“ He shrugged his shoulders in a dismissive manner, and finally looked up at Lance. His eyes widened and his face got hot.  _Have I been rambling?_

“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t, uh, I didn’t mean to ramble.” The words came out faint from Keith’s mouth. Lance almost didn’t hear them.

“No, no, Keith, you’re fine. You’re good. I just didn’t know you ever did this kinda stuff.” Lance didn’t take his eyes off Keith. His smile was warm and made Keith press his lips together in a thin line somewhat resembling a smile. Silence held them, the scribbling of pencils and the voices of classmates filling the space between the two.

“So I guess I just have to write out my part and then we’ll fill in the questions, right?” Lance handed Keith his notebook back. Keith’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “There’s only like, three minutes left in class, there’s no point in trying to work now.” One of Lance’s slender fingers pointed towards the clock on the opposite side of the room, and Keith caught himself staring at Lance’s hand for a bit too long. Keith nodded, his eyes finally trailing to the clock. When he looked back at Lance, he was packing up his backpack.

“You’ll write yours tonight?” Keith heard himself say. Lance looked up at Keith.

“Of course.” With a final zip of his backpack, Lance stood up. He surveyed the room, watching students packing up and putting textbooks back on the shelves. He turned back to Keith. “We should walk to Euro together.” The statement came out more as a command than a suggestion.

“What?”

“I, uh, I mean, could we walk to Euro together?” Lance fiddled with the straps of his backpack, and his eyes were glued to the floor.

“Yeah,” Keith was hesitant as he stood. “That’s fine. We should walk to Euro together.” He paused for a moment, uncertain. “That would be good.” Lance pulled his eyes off the ground and found Keith staring right at him, a welcoming smile on his face paired with soft eyes. It wasn’t until then that Lance noticed that Keith’s eyes were a really dark blue. An odd detail to notice as the bell for second period rang for sure, but one he noticed regardless.

The bell rang, obnoxious as usual, breaking the moment. Lance headed for the door and Keith followed after him.

“Au revoir, Madame!” Lance waved at Madame Stewart as he left the French room and entered the crowded hallway. Looking over his shoulder to make sure Keith was still behind him, Lance waited to fall in step with Keith before walking up the stairs.

“So, what made you decide that we ought to walk to Euro together today of all days, McClain?” Keith raised an eyebrow at Lance, whose grip on his backpack tightened.

“Well, we’ve known each other for four years, and we have the same three classes right in a row, it’s about time we get to know each other better, done you think,  _Kogane_?” Keith rolled his eyes. They made it to the top of the stairs before either of them thought they would.

“Whatever. I’ve had you in classes all four years, just never this many. Why now?”

“Just figured it’s about time.” Lance shrugged his shoulders and ran his hand through his hair. “Besides, I don’t usually walk with anyone, and neither do you, so it’s just convenient so that we have somebody to talk to on the way.”

Keith held back a laugh. “Who said I wanted to talk to you?” When Lance’s fist jokingly made contact with Keith’s arm, he started laughing. “I’m sorry, Lance, you just set yourself up so well.” A smile crept onto Lance’s face as they walked into their AP European History classroom. They sat in the front of the classroom, not far apart at all; Keith was one seat behind Lance. When they sat down, Lance began talking to the people next to him.

Keith had noticed that was normal, Lance just talking to people. They didn’t need to be friends, they just needed to be a person, and Lance would say hello and start up a friendly conversation. Keith watched Lance talking, watched the way his lips moved to form every word he said, the way his face beamed when he was interacting with someone. Keith’s eyes wandered to Lance’s hair. It was curling as it dried. Curious hands reached out to pull at one of the curls that was forming, and rough fingers were met with silk soft hair.

“Woah,” Keith muttered under his breath.

Lance, feeling something in his hair, reached his hand back to pull whatever had gotten stuck out, only to be caught holding Keith’s hand.

“Keith?”

“Dude your hair is so soft what the hell do you do to it?” Keith was unfazed by the fact that Lance was holding his hand in a rather tight grip. His eyes darted towards their hands when Lance didn’t say anything. Instead of saying something witty or sarcastic, Lance sighed and let go of Keith’s hand.

“I didn’t brush it today,” he replied. “I’m surprised it’s this soft.” Keith rolled his eyes, though Lance hadn’t intended what he said to come off as any sort of backhanded comment towards him. “I condition it pretty frequently though. Why do you ask? Like what you feel?” Lance cocked an eyebrow at Keith.

Slumping back in his chair, Keith waved off Lance. “Don’t hurt yourself, loverboy.” Heat rose into Keith’s cheeks. The late bell rang, ending their conversation. Luckily for Keith, the bell rang before Lance could notice him awkwardly shifting his weight in his seat.

 

* * *

 

The rest of European History after the bell rang was rather uneventful. For that matter, so was Psychology, Orchestra, Statistics, Macroeconomics (as thrilling as it can be) and even Cinematography for Keith was just a bunch of information. All he could really do was sit in front of his laptop and stare at a blank Final Cut project, having no clue what to fill it with.

“Keith,” his teacher, Mr. Gallo called. Keith looked over his shoulder to his teacher, who leaned back in his swiveling office chair that Keith wished he could sit in during class.

“Hm?” Keith’s eyes met Mr. Gallo’s gaze through half lidded eyes.

“Did you hear any of what I just said?” Mr. Gallo’s voice had no hint of disappointment or anger, the man rarely even raised his voice, so Keith doubted he was in trouble.

“No, I’ve just been zoning out to be honest.” Keith’s shoulders shrugged before he turned back around in his seat to go back to staring at a blank screen. Mr. Gallo’s deep and mellow voice bled through into his thoughts, though few of the words were registered as something significant. All he could draw from Mr. Gallo’s drone of a voice was that they had two weeks to film a “music video,” the term used lightly and by the inflection in Gallo’s voice, there could be artistic liberties taken with it.

Keith packed up far in advance of the bell to get out of school. He wanted to get home before he had to go to work. His camera sat in its case, staring at him, longing to be looked at. Giving in, Keith reached over the table and opened the case to pull out the camera.

The Canon Rebel T6 has seen better days, but it worked like a charm and Keith refused to give it up. Stories were held within the camera, and not just the pictures. The small chip in the bottom right of the display was from the road trip he and Shiro took to New Orleans two summers ago when Shiro has set his back on top of the case and one of the cables had dug into the screen. The Rebel T6 label had worn off from the years of love. In turning it on, Keith’s finger ran over the top left edge that scuffed from a school project junior year. He had been devastated at the time, but the trip down to St. Armand’s with Shiro to take pictures of he and Allura had been such a good time that he thought fondly of it looking back.

The display came to life, showing the label, and then turning black-Keith always looked through the eyepiece when he took pictures, never at the on screen display. The pictures on the current SD card showed up as Keith looked through the library of photos-stories-held inside. Pictures of Allura and Shiro at the beach showed up first. Summer sun hit Allura’s sun-kissed skin just right, making her appear two shades darker than she really was. The white one piece she wore made her look even darker as well, turning her skin a milk chocolate brown. Shadows were cast across her face from both her sunglasses and her white sun hat. She beamed, her face frozen forever in a laughing state. She was probably laughing at a stupid joke Shiro told her.

The next few pictures were of both Shiro and Allura, a few of them sitting on the beach talking, some of them in the water, one of those actually was a picture of Shiro holding Allura on his shoulders out in the ocean, playfully splashing water up on her. The one after that was a blurred image of Allura falling off his shoulders, and after that, one of Allura coming up, soaking wet and splashing water in Shiro’s direction.

The few images after those, were not of either of them, and not any of the ones Allura had managed to snag of Shiro and Keith together or even Keith by himself. They depicted a couple of children, too similar looking not to be related, playing in the sand and splashing along in the waves that capped and crashed along the shell-laden shores of Anna Maria Island. Their tanned skin glistened with water and was specked with sand their feet kicked up as they ran. In the picture on the display, the girl, who appeared older, as she was taller than the younger boy, was running from him. The boy was carrying what was presumably a full bucket of cold, salty ocean water. Sand flew up behind them as their feet raced across the beach. It was a succession of images, though in one of them, a taller boy, closer to Keith’s age appeared. He was walking to meet the two younger kids. Keith sucked in his breath as he began to flip through the images. The teenage boy Keith now really recognizes as Lance, his skin darkened from days out in the sun. His hair had begun the process of air drying, slight curls forming at the nape of his neck and at his temples. When the younger kids, presumably his siblings, ran up to him, the little boy threw the water on him. Lance smiled, and in a sequence of photos, Keith could tell Lance was laughing. One image showed him picking up his younger sister. All things considered, this had been the moment Keith noticed his heart (both when he took the pictures and in class that day) racing.

Mrs. Clare’s voice came over the loudspeaker for the end of day announcements, saving Keith from his own thoughts running rampant. He was quick to turn off the camera and put it back in its case, which was placed carefully on top of his notebooks and binders in his backpack. It was mere minutes before the bell rang and kids were flooding the hallways. The building Mr. Gallo’s class was in was never particularly hot, but with hundreds of bodies swarming it and the doors on either end of the hall being held open, the hallway’s temperature rose. As Keith walked out of the building, the humid Florida air hit his skin harsh and unforgiving, a new kind of heat meeting his pale skin.

Keith fought his way to the orchestra room to pick up his cello, hoping to make it there before some of the other usual culprits did so that he could get in and out quick. It didn’t take long for him to pack up his instrument and head out to the senior parking lot. Somebody hit his cello as he started to cross the street.

“Sorry!” They yelled over their shoulder at him as they parted ways.

“It’s fine,” Keith replied. “I guess…” He maintained a steady but slow pace to the parking lot. He didn’t want to risk his instrument getting hit anymore and if he walked slow enough he knew that people would just pass him.

One person didn’t though.

Lance fell into step with Keith as he reached the sidewalk that bordered the senior lot. Hands shoved in his pockets, Lance nudged Keith gently to get his attention.

“Hey.”

Keith looked up to see Lance next to him, surprised with himself that he didn’t notice the tall, lanky boy walking besides him sooner.

“Hey,” Keith managed to say. Lance took his hands out of his pockets and pulled his earbuds out of his ears.

“So, I want to propose a plan to you, Mullet.” Lance hung his headphones around his neck and wrapped an arm around Keith. “We should work together on that Euro project.”

“Oh yeah? Just like ‘We should walk to Euro together?’” Keith smirked and let out a small laugh. Lance’s cheeks got hot when Keith recalled his blunder from earlier in the day.

“You know what I meant,” Lance let his hand fall from Keith’s shoulder. Keith wished he had kept it there. “We should work on it together because it would be a nice thing to do. You don’t typically work with other people in that class. It’ll be good for you, Mullet.”

“Quit calling me ‘Mullet’ and you have yourself a deal, McClain.”

Lance smiled and clapped his hands together. “So it’s settled then!” Keith started at the volume of Lance’s exclamation. Excitement filled Lance, sending him to step in front of Keith quickly and turn around to face him. Walking backwards wasn’t a good idea in the student parking lot, but he could trust Keith to tell him if there was a car coming, right?

Keith and Lance’s eyes met for a moment before Keith’s gaze darted to the ground. Something felt wrong about looking at Lance in that moment. Lance had begun to ramble about his ideas for the project and the subject matter they had to cover. His enthusiasm was sometimes tiring, but Keith just wanted to listen for now. When he raised his eyes to look at Lance, he stopped him where he was.

“My car is this way, keep walking with me?” Keith jerked a thumb towards parking spot 027, where his car sat waiting for him.

“Sure,” Lance shrugged. “So-“

“Hey, Lance, uh, what exactly did we do in Econ today?” Keith asked, his voice quiet. “I was paying attention, but I didn’t quite understand what we were doing.”

“Oh, yeah, we did stuff with supply and demand, graph shifts and stuff.” Lance turned back around and continued walking besides Keith. “So, what are you confused about, determinants, how they shift, where should I start?” Keith, racked his brain for the last thing he remembered fully understanding in that class, but it wasn’t coming to him. Even with the little bit that Lance had said, nothing was ringing any bells.

“Uh, how about you just start from the beginning.” Keith said, unlocking his car. Approaching it, he opened the backseat door set his cello down on the seat.

“So,” Lance began as Keith closed the car door, leaning against it. Folded arms over Keith’s chest acted as a sort of barrier, not to keep Lance out, but to keep Keith in. Lance had begun talking, but Keith really only watched him, not paying attention to the words that came out of his mouth. He caught a few things, like “determinants” and “left or rightward shift,” but for the most part he was preoccupied watching the way Lance’s body moved has he spoke. This close to him, Keith could see that Lance had freckles that dusted his cheeks. Keith shifted his weight from one leg to the other, still not taking his eyes off Lance.

“I mean, those are the basics, do you want me to go into more detail?” Lance talked with his hands, and they now sat somewhat crossed (if that was even the right word for it) in front of him.

Keith sighed, forcing himself refocus on what was immediately happening in front of him. “No, no you’re good. I don’t know why I can never seem to understand it in class. You explain it well.” Lance beamed at Keith’s approval of him, making Keith raise an eyebrow at the reaction.  _Do people not give him the credit he deserves for things?_  “Thanks.” Keith’s lips were pressed together in a thin line, and Lance couldn’t quite tell if Keith was uncomfortable or if he just wanted to leave and stop talking to him. Either way, Keith had said something nice to him.  _Keith_  said something  _nice_  to  _him_.

“Well, I guess I’ll see you around,” Keith said, turned towards the passenger door of his car to set down his backpack.

Lance replied a little to quick, “Yeah, I’ll see you tomorrow.” Keith’s eyes darted in Lance’s direction, making his heart flutter for a split second. He idled beside his car for just a moment before walking around the front of his car to the drivers side door.

“Hey Keith,” Lance found himself saying. He couldn’t remember making a conscious decision to say anything to Keith, but he went with it.

“Yeah?”

“I, uh, I always see you walking around with like, I think it’s a camera bag? I dunno what it’s for but like-”

Keith nodded in approval. “Yeah, it’s for my film class here. I have to figure out how to set up a scene for a music video-esque project due in a couple weeks.” He opened the car door and leaned over it. “It’s gonna be a pain, but I’ll figure it out.”

Lance smiled wide at Keith’s words. “Well, if you ever need music for it just hit me up. I’ll write something and record it for you.” Keith’s eyebrows shot up and his eyes went wide. Lance may not have seen it, but there was a slight blush creeping into his cheeks. “I’m always down to write new music.” The air between them was tense, and Lance waved a goodbye at Keith with a nervous hand as he backed up to walk away.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” Keith called after Lance, whose hands were set firmly on the straps of his backpack.

Lance waved a hand at him, almost like a salute, as he started walking towards his 2003 Toyota Camry. “See you later, Mullet.”


	2. Old Memories

It was a calm morning, the late summer sun shone high in the sky and there was a light breeze outside. Shiro could smell the morning dew starting to evaporate from the grass as he cracked open the windows in the kitchen to let the sunshine in. The coffee pot clicked, signaling the end of a brew and he poured himself a cup. He took a small sip as he leaned against the counter. A glance at the kitchen clock and he realized that Keith was getting a late start to the day, even for a day that’s he decided not to go to school.

Shiro walked to Keith’s room to wake him up, coffee cup in hand. Shiro never minded that Keith sometimes took days off school. It was a stressful thing and everyone needed a break every once in a while, but he also knew that if Keith didn’t get up before Shiro left for work, that he wouldn’t be up until dinner time.

He knocked on the door to Keith’s bedroom once, then twice, but no response. He cracked open the door and saw Keith in a tangled mess of sheets. Shiro also saw clothes strewn all over the floor, school books and papers scattered across Keith’s desk and dresser, and his computer lid cracked open next to him in bed.

The smell of coffee and Shiro’s voice woke Keith up, not Shiro’s knocking or the creaking of his bedroom door. He rolled over in bed and cracked open an eye to look at Shiro. He was dressed for work in his usual, a black jacket thrown over a navy tank top and black Adidas joggers with a white stripe down the side. A muffled moan escaped Keith’s lips as he turned his head to bury it further in the pillow he was holding.

“Keith,” Shiro said gently. It wasn’t quite a whisper, it fell between that and talking. Keith groaned louder. Shiro chuckled to himself and took a few more steps into Keith’s room. He stood just next to his bed, and he leaned over and rubbed his hand on Keith’s shoulder. “Keith, you’re already late for school, I assume you’re not going?”

“Mhm.” Keith’s response was dulled by the pillow.

“I just want you to be up and doing things before I leave.” Keith turned his head towards Shiro and cracked open one eye, unamused. “Keith, you and I both know that if you’re not out of bed soon you’re just going to go back to sleep and stay asleep until dinner time.” He just stared back at Shiro with blank eyes, searching his face for anything.

With one last groan, Keith sat up and pulled his covers around his body. His fan whirred in his room, circulating stale air, the chains clanking against each other. At night, it helped him sleep. When he woke up, it was a nuisance.

“You’re not wrong, but that doesn’t mean I should.” Keith stayed sitting on his bed hunched over as Shiro ruffled his hair.

“At least I’m not demanding that you shower.” Shiro began to leave Keith’s room. “That would just be inhumane.” He laughed. Keith stood from his place in his bed, letting his comforter fall from his shoulders.

“Well, I have to anyways. I work later today, so.” He shrugged, pulling a sweater from his closet.

“Gotta blast, kid. I’ll see you for dinner.” Keith heard Shiro pick up his workout bag and then his binder.

“I won’t be home until 8!” Keith yelled at Shiro as he walked out the door. Keith yanked the sweater over his head and padded back to his bed. His computer screen was black, but with a touch of his finger to the trackpad, the screen came to life to reveal a page document with far too few paragraphs. He was supposed to be planning for his cinematography project, writing out a summary of sorts for the scenes. What he had managed to do last night was turn on a playlist of music and write a couple of measly paragraphs about the overarching theme of the video.

Keith sat down on his bed, one leg tucked underneath him, and pulled his computer onto his lap. Reading over what he had already written, it was sloppy, to say the least. He reached a weary hand up to his face and rubbed his eyes hard, trying to clear his mind. Unable to produce anything, Keith reached for his phone on his bedside table. 12:27. Shiro wasn’t wrong when he said that it was late.

Keith shuffled out into the kitchen, phone in hand to see a cup already set out for him. A smile spread across Keith’s face as he leaned over the counter to grab the mug. He reached for the coffee pot and poured himself a cup. Keith moved towards the refrigerator, playing with the idea of adding creamer. His phone vibrated and lit up in his hand displaying a text from Lance Mcclain.

Keith forgot that Lance even had his number. They had traded numbers when they were going to be working on a project back in sophomore year together before the groups got rearranged. Keith’s thumb hovered over the notification for a moment, knowing that he probably needed to open it eventually.

Pressing his thumb down on the notification, and then the home button of his phone, the message appeared on his screen after a moment of delay.

_hey you big nerd, where are you at? thought you’d be at school today. madame wanted to see your part of the script tomorrow first thing since you were out today. figured i’d send mine your way._

Beneath the text was a picture of what looked to be completely illegible handwriting. Keith had to zoom in to make out most of the words. As he was reading, another text came in.

_could you send me yours so that we have the entire thing done when we walk into class tomorrow? i don’t have any questions written out for you yet haha._

Keith hesitated, his thumbs hovering over the keyboard of his phone. A grey text bubble with three dots in it bounced to life for a split second before disappearing. They stayed tucked away behind Lance’s fingers on the other side of the phone, giving Keith a chance to respond.

_Yeah, yeah, that’s fine. You’ll have to give me a minute to find it, I just woke up._  Keith sent it and waited for a response.

_you just woke up??? how??? i can’t sleep past 8 even on the weekends?????_  
  
Keith laughed ever so slightly, his lips curling up in a smile.

_I guess I was tired, I dunno. I didn’t think much of it, and usually Shiro just lets me stay home if I sleep in. He assumes it's with good reason because I don’t typically miss school._

Setting down his phone, Keith opened the fridge and pulled out the Caramel Macchiato International Delight coffee creamer, pouring a decent amount into his now lukewarm coffee. He yanked open the microwave door with a harsh tug; the microwave had needed to be replaced for a solid 3 years, but he and Shiro could never scrap together the funds to get a new one. It was one of the last things on their renovation list that hadn’t even been started because their cars were so problematic. His phone vibrated nonstop, from what Keith assumed was either a call or a barrage of texts from Lance. He walked past it when he pulled his coffee out of the microwave and sat down on the couch. Feet curled up underneath him, Keith turned on the TV with the remote on the coffee table.

The channel that came up first was the channel he and Shiro had been watching together last night: HGTV. It was something they did any day Shiro wasn’t working extra shifts at Ferraro’s waiting tables. They always blocked out time to watch an episode or two of Love It or List It; Keith was a religious “Lover” and Shiro a “Lister” all the way.

This morning, Beachfront Bargain was on, and Keith, though not as interested in the show, enjoyed it enough to watch it. Occasionally they would be somewhere near Bradenton on the show, like Tampa or Sarasota, though he’d never seen a place like Anna Maria on. Keith sipped in his coffee as he watched the episode.

The couple had three kids and was looking for a summer vacation home in Venice. Everywhere they’d looked was dissatisfying to Keith. One house had five bedrooms, three and a half baths, which itself was a comfortable space, but the kitchen was smaller than he thought appropriate for a house that big. The second house only had three bedrooms and three baths, but it had a pool that featured a beautiful view overlooking the beach.

“That house is beautiful why wouldn’t they take it?” Keith muttered to himself as they toured the third and final house for the episode. The third house was a solid ten minute drive from the coastline, but was on a spacious plot of land. The big backyard at the moment was home to a large patio setting with a built in fireplace, a swing seat and an above ground hot tub. The house was a four-bedroom, four-bath with a kitchen that needed a bit of an updating.

At a commercial break, Keith shuffled back to his room to get his computer. He shoved open his bedroom door and was greeted with the same messy room as before, only this time, he realized how dirty it really was. His backpack was thrown across the room and his bed was disheveled from a night of tossing and turning. Rarely did he dream, and when he did they were usually bad dreams. He couldn’t remember what he dreamt about last night, no matter how hard he racked his brain. His laundry hamper looked like a bomb had gone off in it, clothes scattered everywhere. "I need to clean up later." Keith made a mental note to himself as his eyes caught sight of a few piles of clothes that needed to be put away.

Keith leaned down onto his bed to grab his computer before heading back out into the living room. He made a stop in the kitchen to pick up his phone and landed back on the couch. His MacBook wobbled on his lap as he adjusted his legs to be more comfortable, and the commercial break ended as he lifted the lid.   
“So, I think we made a decision,” the husband said as he put his arm around his wife.

“And we’ve decided on,” The wife paused and looked at her husband. Keith couldn’t deny that they looked cute together, and with the creases in the corners of their eyes, he could tell that they were really happy with each other. Keith found his mind wandering to his own future, and the person who was with him in it. They were tall, had soft skin, a gentle smile, beautiful blue eyes-

“House 2,” they said in unison. The show panned to the house and gave the same shots from before as they talked about why they chose the house. At the end of the program, as Keith finished off his coffee, a video of the family playing in their yard played while the credits rolled.

Keith scanned back over what he had written the night before for his film project, and reading over it he realized that the nonsense he had written wasn’t really as garbage as he thought it was. It just was poorly written. His phone vibrated again as he set his hands on the keyboard of his laptop to continue planning, this time in a more detailed manner. Keith picked up his phone and read the text from Lance.

_just an fyi, madame is letting everyone have another day, pretty much nobody but us has the rough draft done._

He scrolled back up to see what else Lance had texted him. Mostly nonsense, but he appreciated the fact that Lance even bothered to text him. They were things like “ _dude please save me i hate this. wtf this class is murder!!_ ” Keith laughed to himself at Lance’s expressiveness, even in his texts. It was like he was sitting right next to him.

After a few minutes of working on his planning, Keith realized he had come to an impasse with it and decided he would practice cello for a bit before he got ready for work.

The dark blue case sat in the corner of the living room next to the single chair that matched their beat-up couch and loveseat. It was in pristine condition despite having gone through years of love. One of the latches was near breaking, and Keith had debated between getting it fixed and just getting a new case. Undoing the latch, he realized that it may have been pointless to take out his cello, seeing as it was nearly 1 and he really needed to get ready for work.

Regardless, he pulled at the velcro that held the neck of his cello in place and pulled the coda bow from it’s holding spot in the case. He carefully carried his well-loved cello into the dining room, which had the only chairs in the house suitable for practice. The chairs had a faux, red velvet seat pad that was surprisingly comfortable. Sitting down, Keith laid his cello across his legs and unscrewed the end peg to pull it out. Keith’s cello sat between his legs, the curves in the sides resting comfortably on his knees. The light brown wood felt comfortable against his calves as he held it firm, tightening his bow until the hair had only a slight bend to it. There was an aged sort of smell that emanated from the finish of his cello, and it made Keith feel like he was at home. He placed his thumb against the neck of the cello and his fingers hovered over the fingerboard in a normal finger pattern. The bow hair lay on the strings, Keith wasn’t going to bother to time for such a short practice session.

As his bow began to glide over the strings, practicing a concerto he’d been learning for nearly a year, he let his mind wander off again, though not to the future, to the now. His fingers moved effortlessly as he graced over a harmonic before falling back against the fingerboard with a violent burst of vibrato. In his mind, he could see tanned skin, freckles that scattered shoulders, cheeks, arms and chest, back and neck, dark brown hair that curled gently against the nape of a neck and the temples on either side of a face, ocean blue eyes that glistened in summer sun. Keith’s bow slid towards the bridge of the cello as he realized who he was thinking of. He hadn’t noticed that his eyes had been closed and his brow had been furrowed. Keith let his hand drop from the neck of his cello and he leaned his forehead in the scroll.

Hopefully work would push the images of Lance out of his mind.

 

* * *

 

Keith parked his primary red Volkswagen Beetle in the beat up parking lot of Latte Luna. The concrete all over the parking lot had been torn up from years of Florida storms and trees uprooting it near the curbs. He let his car run for a little bit to finish the song that was playing. He had an entire playlist dedicated to his favorite oldies, and he wasn’t about to turn off his car while ‘A Hard Day’s Night’ by the Beetles was playing.

_But when I get home to you, I find the things that you do, will make me feel alright..._

The song took him back to the summer he and Shiro had updated the car’s sound system. When they bought it at the end of his junior year, it could play nothing but cassette tapes, and not even Shiro had any of those from when he was younger. He could still hear the song playing in the background as he and Shiro sat in the garage, sodas in hand as they worked.

_“Keith, pass me my drink, would you?” Shiro sat back in the front seat of the used, red Volkswagen Beetle, wiping the sweat beading on his forehead. He held a rag in his hand that he had been using to clean the interior of the car. Keith had promised to pay for the car in totality if it meant Shiro would help him with updates and cleaning. He was beginning to regret taking the deal._

_Keith came up next to the driver's side of the car and handed Shiro the Pepsi from the garage shelf. The soda had gone flat and was threatening to get warm, but he knew Shiro wouldn’t mind._

_“Your highness,” Keith joked, leaning against the door frame as he handed Shiro the can._

_“Ha ha, very funny.”_

_“I should go into stand-up comedy, Shiro. Abandon all hopes of anything else, just horrible jokes with bad timing.” Keith laughed._

_Shiro cracked a smile as he raised the can up to his lips. “Oh, yeah, the bad timing alone would make you a living. You’re the definition of bad timing.”_

_Keith managed a small laugh as he stepped away from the car to grab his own drink, a Dr. Pepper, as he headed back into the house._

_“Where are you going?” Shiro asked._

_“Getting the stereo, I can’t stand to do this work anymore without music.” Keith returned in almost no time with the old CD player that Shiro had bought when he was in college in one hand, a few CDs in another. It had seen better days but worked like a charm. Shiro caught a glimpse of some of the CD titles and put in his two cents before Keith could make an executive decision._

_“If I have to listen to any of that-”_

_“Hey, be nice!”_

_“-I would prefer to listen to the Beatles.”_

_Keith held up two CDs. One was ‘Love,’ and the other was ‘1.’ “So, what’ll it be?”_

_“1, it’s the better of the two overall.” Shiro gestured to ‘1,’ which Keith held in his left hand. His face pinched up in what Shiro could only guess was betrayal._

_“Shiro! How dare you! Love has Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Heart Club Band Reprise, arguably the better of the two, I’m ashamed to call you my brother.” Keith smiled as he set down the stereo and popped open the CD slot. He opened the case to ‘1’ and placed the CD in with care. Keith cherished the Beatles CDs, he had more than most of his other CDs._

_Shiro stepped out of the car to grab the pieces for the new sound system Keith wanted to install in the car. There was no way he would survive without music in his car. “You know what I want to start with, Keith.”_

_“Can we not listen to the album in order?” Shiro shook his head, causing Keith to roll his eyes. “You never let me listen to my music like I want to.” Keith whined._

_"Yeah, Keith, I do. Every time I let you play music in my car.” Shiro waved Keith off in a dismissive manner, though he knew Keith was joking with his whining. Once the song was over, he knew Keith would race back to start the CD over from the beginning._  
  
_“Fine, whatever, Shiro. As you wish.” Keith skipped ahead to track six, ‘A Hard Day’s Night.’_

_The opening chord struck, and immediately, Shiro set down the radio equipment for Keith’s new used car and whipped around to face him. He pretended to hold a mic to his face like he was performing the song for an audience. Keith rolled his eyes and smiled wide, taking a few steps closer to Shiro. As soon as John Lennon came on singing the verse, Shiro began singing himself._

_“It’s been a hard day’s night, and I’ve been wokrin’ like a dog!” Shiro sang, his eyes shut tight, a smile wide on his face as he leaned down into the invisible mic he held. He held the fake mic out to Keith, who took it without hesitation and sang the second line of the first verse._

_“It’s been a hard day’s night, I should be sleepin’ like a log.” As he finished up the verse, Shiro stepped close next to him and they held the non-existent mic together to finish the verse off._

_“But when I get home to you, I find the things that you do will make me feel all right!” They yell-sang it, eyes squinted shut and trying desperately not to laugh. When it came time to sing the next line, Keith was laughing too hard to continue, but that didn’t stop Shiro from going on._

By the time Keith realized the song was over and had moved on to ‘I Feel Fine,’ he had already ran through the whole memory in his mind. It had taken them a while to recover from the fake performance they held in the garage. Thinking about it a bit more as he turned off his car to go into work, Keith remembered that being the first time Shiro ever met Allura. She had been across the street, helping a friend move in, and walked over to the open garage to find two big nerds singing and dancing to The Beatles. Keith smiled remembering it, walking up the steps to the little coffee house.

Keith checked the time as he walked in and waved hello to a few of the regulars that sat near the front of the house. The clock read nearly 2, which meant soon there would be more people there, mainly students. Thankfully, he was only waiting on the back half of the restaurant.

“Keith, you made it,” A girl said from behind him. He turned around and saw Nyma, one of his coworkers, leaning over the counter. Her long, dirty blonde hair was pulled back into a braid that sat high on top of her head. She smiled at him. “We were worried you weren’t going to come in.”

Keith shrugged. “I was sitting in my car listening to The Beatles, what can I say.”

Nyma raised a thick eyebrow at him. “The Beatles? With that music taste how is every hipster girl at ‘THE’ Manatee High swooning at your very presence?” She laughed as she grabbed an empty cake case off the counter and walked back into the kitchen.

“Shut up, Nyma.” Keith walked towards the back of the house and into the kitchen, tying his apron as he went. He worked his way through the kitchen to the front as the clock in the front struck 2 pm. Keith took his place at the register and when he looked up at the door as the bell rang, he saw one face he definitely wasn’t expecting to see.

Lance didn’t make eye contact with Keith, but noticed him for sure. He also noticed that Keith’s eyes went wide as he walked through the door. In all the times he came to Latte Luna, Lance had never seen Keith working, which was a surprise, considering Lance was a regular. Lance smiled slightly to himself, keeping his head down as he headed back to his usual spot at the back of the house where the windows were big and the chairs were warm. He passed the kitchen and saw Nyma, one of his longtime friends, and waved. She shot a smile in his direction, her hands were full with what Lance assumed to be dirty dishes. Lance sat down at his usual table in the room farthest back in the house in the corner by the biggest window in the room. The sun that shone through was warm on his skin, and he set down his backpack in the seat next to him. As he unzipped it, he heard footsteps coming in his direction.

“Hey, Lance. Can I get you anything?” Keith’s voice was tense when he spoke, and it made Lance smile. Keith’s eyes caught the freckles that scattered Lance’s cheeks and distracted himself by pulling out a pad of paper and a pen.

“Uh, yeah. I’ll have a Caramel Macchiato, iced please, and a Viva Italia. School lunch was absolutely horrible today, unlike you.” Lance cocked an eyebrow at Keith, who’s grip on his pen had tightened. His pen stopped writing and his cheeks were dusted pink. “Speaking of you, why weren’t you at school today, Mullet?”

Keith shoved the pad of paper into his apron and his eyes darted around, trying to land on anything but Lance. “Oh, I woke up late. Like, late.” Keith’s hand rubbed the back of his neck and his shoulders raised. Lance smiled, leaning forward onto the table with one hand resting under his chin.

“Late? So you mean you just slept in.” Keith nodded in response. He wanted to go back to the kitchen and scream a bit. What made Lance so keen on messing with him?

“Well, you missed Euro, which was uneventful in and of itself, but Kaminski assigned a project and I figured we could work together. Everyone else partnered up, and it left me flying solo. Wanna be my co-pilot?” Keith’s eyes widened and Lance had to stifle a laugh. “I mean, like for the project.” Lance’s heart was racing, and he was panicking as much on the inside as Keith was on the outside.

“Uh, yeah, uh, I-I-I, I would love to. Yeah, be your project-I mean work on you, wait that’s not what I meant! I-uh, yes. Yes, yes. Project. Me. You. Yes, yeah I’d like that.” Keith’s words came a mile a minute and Lance could only smile fondly at him. His eyes darted this way and that and he ended up staring at the ground with his arms folded against his chest, his hands holding his arms in a white-knuckled grip.

“Alright, it’s a done deal then.” Lance pulled a notebook out of his backpack with shaking hands, though Keith didn’t catch the wavering hand that set the notebook down. “See you at school tomorrow?” Keith’s eyes finally met Lance’s.

“Yeah, school tomorrow.” Keith nodded and walked back to the kitchen, dreading the barrage of questions that were undoubtedly to come from Nyma.


	3. Lunch

This morning, it was Keith’s turn to be late, though he didn’t try and make a show out of it like Lance did. He had woken up supremely late, tired and quite frankly disgusted with the fact he hadn’t showered the night before. His backpack was half full; Keith knew as he threw his backpack in the backseat of his car that morning that he wouldn’t have everything with him and that he didn’t care one way or the other. He was used to disappointing most of his teachers.

As he approached his French classroom, Keith realized that he didn’t have what he needed for any class other than French and Film. Everything else-AP Statistics, AP European History, even his cumbersome AP Psychology binder-sat on either his cluttered desk or unmade bed remained at home. The wooden door of Madame’s class stood before him, taunting him with his tardiness. He knew as soon as he got into class he would have to set down his things and go back up to the office for a pass, so he contemplated it was worth it to even bother knocking. _Cut out the middle man._ Keith thought.

Going against his first thought, he raised a fist to the door and knocked three times, not too fast and not too slow. Through the small window in the door, Keith caught sight of Lance smirking at him on the opposite side of the classroom. It was Olia that opened the classroom door for him. She smiled at him slightly, her lips pressed together in a thin line. Her eyes hid behind her bangs like normal, so Keith couldn’t quite tell if it was a pity smile or a welcoming smile.

“Sorry Madame, got caught up with work things last night,” Keith muttered as he walked towards his desk. Madame, however, didn’t even look up from her desk. Keith set down his backpack in his chair and the started to walk back to the door to leave for the front office for his late pass. “I’ll be back in like, five minutes tops.”

Madame Stewart looked up from whatever she was grading and set down her signature red pen. “Keith, where are you going? Sit down, you don’t have to go to the office.” She shook her head at him in wonder.

“But, I was late, don’t I need a pass?” Keith pointed towards the door and then glanced back to his seat for a moment. He noticed Lance’s eyes were trailing what he was doing.

“No, just sit down Keith, it’s not a problem.” Madame picked her pen back up and continued grading the stack of papers piled high on her desk. “We’re working on rough drafts of our skits this morning though, so get going.” She didn’t even bother to look at Keith as he trudged back to his desk.

Even though he had only been up for an hour or so, sleep began to tug at the edge of Keith’s consciousness. He moved his backpack from his seat so he could sit. Lance perked up as Keith began to take out his French notebook.

“So, Mullet, what’s it like being late? Not like I don’t know, I just feel like it’s a different experience for everybody.” Lance leaned towards Keith, his elbow resting under him for support. “I didn’t think you’d be late after yesterday to be honest. You know, with just not coming to school at all because you woke up late.” Keith’s grip on his notebook tightened. He refrained from handing it over to Lance. Anger bubbled up in his chest as he realized that Lance was treading water. Keith was contemplating just giving Madame his script and leaving for a practice room to save both Lance and himself from a fight not worth having.

“Why did you skip yesterday? I mean other than sleeping in. Are you just too cool for any of this education stuff? What made today different from yesterday? Were you just like, ‘Oh, I guess I’ll go today, I just kinda feel like it,’ as you pulled on the same jacket you wore two days ago? The same jacket you’ve worn almost every day, as it seems.” Lance at this point was leaning back in his chair, unaware of the building rage in Keith. He ran a hand through his dark brown hair and smiled the same charismatic smile that any other day would’ve made Keith’s heart soar. “Did you have trouble getting out of bed yesterday or something? Did you just lay there for a few hours thinking that it wasn’t even worth it to go to school? I just don’t get it Keith, my mom would /kill/ me if I didn’t show every day of the year.”

Keith whipped around to face Lance. HIs eyebrows were knit together because of Lance like they had been when he practiced the day before, only this time, it was sheer anger behind his expression. “Lance, I don’t care if you think that there’s something wrong with me picking and choosing the days I come to school, but I sure as _hell_ don’t appreciate you trying to throw yourself into my life, asking why I decide not to come to this shit hole! Nothing about this place is great, not even you and your smug ass smirk that you shoot at anybody and everybody you think you may have a chance with.”

Keith’s voice had risen to a yell by the end of what he was saying. He zipped up his backpack and grabbed his French notebook from his desk. All eyes were on him as he stormed over to Madame Stewart’s desk. Even Madame herself was shocked at Keith’s outburst. Typically, he kept his head, but something about the way he said everything was more brash than usual, even for when he got upset.

“I’m going to a practice room,” Keith said with a certain finality as he set his French notebook down on Madame’s desk. She looked up at him for a moment to see that he was already heading out the door. If his march of sheer anger didn’t tell it enough, the slam of the door definitely did.

“Are you going to do anything, Madame?” A girl asked, turning around in her seat to face Madame Stewart’s desk. Madame had already gone back to grading papers. Keith’s notebook was set on top of a wobbly stack of papers, threatening to topple.

Madame shrugged her shoulders and looked up at the girl. “Honestly, no.”

Lance’s face had scrunched up as Keith yelled at him. His face was still scrunched, and he contemplated for a moment if he wanted to go after Keith. He sat slouched over his notebook that laid open, taunting him. Keith’s part of the script stuck out on the page. It was in Lance’s hand writing, but it screamed at him in Keith’s voice. His throat tightened and behind his eyes stung with tears threatening to spill over onto his cheeks. Blinking a few times, he held off the inevitable anxiety attack that was bound to come as soon as he left the classroom to go to second period.

Keith had stomped his way into the orchestra room to practice the concerto he had been working on at home the other day. He accidentally slammed open the double doors to the orchestra room, startling all the freshman. Every head turned to Keith, stopping him in his tracks. Eyes wide, he caught Mrs. Johanson’s surprised gaze.

“Keys?” He said with a shrug of his shoulders. She took her lanyard off and tossed it back to him. Keith caught the lanyard in between his middle and ring finger and held it up triumphantly. Mrs. Johanson gave a questioning thumbs up as Keith headed into the instrument storage room to get his cello he had dropped off not five minutes ago. He opened the door to the instrument storage room and was greeted with chairs and stains strewn around, music scattered across them. The personal cello locker was unlocked, and he had to stop for a moment to think about if he had just forgotten to lock it or if there was anyone that could have taken out another one of the personal instruments from the locker that class period.

As he left the instrument storage room, cello in hand, there was a freshman who was heading in to pack up his violin. Keith paused, wanting to question where he was going, but realized that it wasn’t the end of class yet and that he probably got called to guidance or something of the sorts.

The hallway was dead silent. Nobody was wandering this early in the morning, which made practicing easy. No fighting for practice rooms, no arguing with band kids over who needs more space, nothing. Keith walked down the hall a bit and went to the first small practice room with a piano. When he went to unlock the door, he found it already unlocked.

“Of course,” Keith muttered. He shoved open the practice room door with some force-the rubber base of the door was falling off and regularly got caught on the carpet of the practice room. The light flicked on and the air in the room was different than the air in the hallway. It was more dense in a way, like it had been through more people. Keith sat down in the lone chair in the room and pulled out his end pin. As he tightened his bow, the curve of the hairs disappeared bit by bit until there was just a slight dip in the stick. Checking tuning, annoying as it could be sometimes, was a necessity, so he leaned over the right side of his cello with care and reached around to the tuners. String by string, Keith pulled his bow across each one, listening with careful ears to the intonation. When he was satisfied, he placed his left hand on the neck of his cello and his bow on the strings.

He started at the beginning of the concerto. Keith had learned to love it over the past year of practicing. Preliminary auditions were in about a month and a half, and he was feeling pretty good about his piece. He knew it like the back of his hand at this point. His fingers graced over a few harmonics and then barred over for double stops as the bell for first period to end rang. With the reminder of his error first period, Keith’s mind wandered to Lance and the way his face had contorted into complete terror when he yelled. He hadn’t meant to upset him, but Keith’s yelling voice could definitely be a lot to handle. In his head, Keith could see the distressed look on Lance’s face. Something about his face looked on the verge of tears-

The practice room door opened, startling Keith, and unlike other times when it was somebody poking their head in to tell him he sounded good or even to hit on him, this time it was Lance. Keith let his bow fall from the strings of his cello as he looked over Lance, the same boy who, around 10 minutes ago, had mocked him for his tardiness. Lance closed the door with a hard shove. He leaned against it for support, crossing his hands in front of him and running his right hand over his left. His eyes didn’t leave the ground as he began to speak.

“Keith, I’m sorry about French this morning, I was just trying to make a joke, I didn’t think-“

Keith burst out at Lance again, his voice like venom. “Yeah, well when do you ever think, huh? You don’t, that’s the thing. Did you even consider that maybe I had a rough night last night and that I didn’t want that night to get in the way of _my_ school time? So what if I miss a day here or there because I sleep in. It’s ok to take breaks, Lance, there’s nothing wrong with that.” Keith’s eyes shot daggers into Lance, who’s eyes shot up when Keith interrupted him.

“God, you can be so inconsiderate sometimes, Lance. Shiro was literally puking his guts out last night from food poisoning or something, I was up until 3 just sitting next to him in the bathroom. Do you ever think about other people’s lives? Like, at all?” Keith’s gaze wandered as he spoke, but fell back to Lance as he finished his statement. Lance’s eyes were squinted in a desperate attempt not to cry. Tears truly threatened to spill this time. Lance’s eyes shifted back and forth from Keith to his cello, trying to find any words to say.

“Lance, do you ever think about anything before you say it? I mean-” Before Keith could truly recognize the shift in emotion in Lance and take back his words, the Cuban boy was gone. Just as quickly as he appeared he disappeared. “Lance!” Keith called after him. He pulled open the practice room door but Lance was nowhere to be seen. Keith’s stomach dropped into his feet and a hot wash of guilt passed over him. He hadn’t realized that his own words did the same thing to Lance that Lance’s had done to him.

Lance raced into the chorus room without a moment’s hesitation. He knew full well that had he stayed in the practice room with Keith one second longer and he would’ve had an anxiety attack right then and there. It was all he could do to keep from starting to shake as he shoved past students in the hallway to get to the choir room. As the door opened with the slightest push, Lance’s eyes darted around the room, looking for Mr. Erikson. He was a tall man, only a few inches taller than Lance himself. His rectangle framed glasses really completed the dad look that he had.

Lance spotted the top of Erikson’s head through a few girls over the piano. He swallowed the guilt that rose in his throat at an alarming rate as he began to break down bit by bit as he walked to Erikson at the front of the room. Lance had already begun crying and hyperventilating as he approached the teacher who had become like a dad over the past 4 years. Erikson, hearing the sniffling mess that was currently Lance, broke his gaze from the music set out in front of him on the piano.

“Lance, are you ok?” Erikson stood up to put a hand on Lance’s shoulder and Lance just collapsed into him. Lance’s crying was muffled by Erikson’s shirt, and most of the girls on the risers had quieted down to watch the exchange between Lance and their teacher. Lance mumbled something into his shirt, but did nothing to reiterate what he said. He wouldn’t let go of Erikson.

“Hey, Lance, we should go in my office so that you can calm down, ok?” Erikson managed to pull Lance off himself for long enough to get a solid nod from Lance and help him walk into his office. Shooing a few girls out of his office was the least of his concerns as he shut the door to his office and Lance sat down in the chair opposite his desk to cry. His voice came short as he struggled to breathe. Erickson closed his door with a hard shove and then walked behind Lance and placed a gentle hand on his back.

“Lance, do you just need time to calm down?” Erikson asked. His voice was shaky, mirroring Lance’s body that shook violently with each breath he drew. Lance’s head shook yes, his hair falling into his face. His cheeks glistened with tears that continued to stream down his face. The late bell rang and Lance looked up at the ceiling, dejected. Erikson could only stare at Lance’s shaking frame, clueless to the exchange he and Keith just had.

Erikson sucked in a breath and moved away from Lance for a moment. Lance caved in on himself, wrapping his arms around his torso and buckling over in a futile attempt to calm himself down. Thoughts swam in his head, images of Keith swirling back and forth in his mind as he wondered if anything between he and Keith was gone. Erikson had seen Lance in this state many times, but it usually took him only moments to collect himself.

“Just breathe, Lance. Just breathe.” Lance’s breathing began to level out as Erikson continued to coax him out of his anxiety attack. “Deep breath in… Deep breath out… There you go.” The tears didn’t stop, but Lance’s breathing returned to normal soon enough. Erikson tempted the idea of asking what happened, but decided against it, knowing that it could just as well send Lance back into a downward spiral.

“Can-can, can I-I, can I have a pass to 2nd period?” Lance finally managed to say with a shaky breath. He stood from the seat across from Erikson’s desk and rubbed his eyes.

“Yeah, of course, Lance. Where are you going?” Erikson pulled out a late pass pad from the top right drawer of his desk. He began to fill out Lance’s name, the date and time, leaving his pen to hover over the blank “To” destination line.

“Kaminski. AP European History.” Lance spaced out each word, making sure not to fumble over any and stutter like he usually would after an anxiety attack. He swallowed hard to keep another wave of anxiety from consuming him. Had it not been for the moment that Erikson gave him to breathe, he would have still been dry heaving. Lance tried to push all thoughts of Keith out of his mind as Mr. Erikson tore the pass off the pad of paper and handed it to him.

“Are you alright, Lance? Like, seriously alright? I’m here to talk if you need to.” Erikson leaned back in his chair, knowing that he was done helping Lance. Rarely did he stay in his office and vent, and usually when he did he started out dry-eyed and calm, not tearful and gasping for breath.

Lance gave a fake, half-assed smile as he took the pass. “Yeah, I’m fine. I appreciate it. Thank you.” Lance walked towards the door of Erickson’s office and reached a hand up to the door handle. He turned back around. “Can I have another hug?”

Mr. Erikson smiled and stood from his desk. “Of course, Lance.” Erikson didn’t stand much taller than Lance like he had Lance’s freshman year when he was a spindly legged boy of 5’10”. Lance’s arms still went under his teacher’s though, just like they had for the past four years. Nothing about that changed.

“Thank you.” Lance felt safe in the choir room with Mr. Erikson. It was his home.

Erikson patted Lance’s back as he let go. “You’re welcome, Lance. Now get to class. Your teachers are gonna start hating me because you’re always showing up late with my name on your pass.” Lance laughed a bit as he left the office.

“If you say so. I don’t think Kaminski could hate you though. Not many people can.”

The hallway was dead silent as Lance left the choir room. Lance half expected Keith to still be in the practice room he was in between classes, and he braced himself to hear whatever Keith happened to be working on, but Keith wasn’t there. He had either gone AP Euro or back into the orchestra room. Lance hoped he went to the orchestra room.

As he climbed the small staircase that led out of the music hallway Lance heard voices. It was just a few girls idling by the water fountain down by the Spanish classrooms, and he couldn’t tell if he knew them by their voices. He looked up the stairs that were in the lobby of the Davis Building and then back down the hall, eventually making the decision to go down to the water fountain. Walking down the hall and nearing the girls, he could only recognize one of them, though they weren’t particularly friends. She had been in his classes for the past few years, but he had no outstanding memory of her.

“Hey, Lance,” she said as Lance came near them. Lance picked up his step and stopped when he was a just a bit away from the girls. He didn’t want to impose on their conversation, but anything to get his mind off Keith was welcome at the moment.

“Hey Florona, what’s up?” Lance shoved his hands in his pocket, afraid the two girls would notice him still kind of shaking.

“Nothing much, just trying to waste as much time in Senora Tio’s class as possible, ya know?”

Lance shrugged. “I wouldn’t know for Senora Tio, but I feel that, sure.” Lance turned his attention to the girl he didn’t know. “I’m Lance.”

She smiled at Lance, her eyes darting to the ground as she spoke. “I’m Romelle, it’s nice to meet you.” Romelle pushed a blonde strand of hair behind her ear as her eyes left the floor to look at Lance. She was almost as tall as he was, and her eyes were a dark blue that looked almost purple.

“Nice to meet you too, Romelle.” The smile Lance gave her was gentle. He didn’t want to seem too forward, but he wanted her to know he thought she was cute. Lance was also desperate to forget about Keith.

“Where are you supposed to be Lance?” Florona said, pulling Lance’s attention to herself.

“Oh, I’m heading to AP Euro,” Lance finally shifted his gaze back to her. “Kamiski.”

“Oh, I had him for World History sophomore year,” Romelle piped up. She fiddled with the hem of her shirt with perfectly manicured hands. “He’s so sweet.”

Lance raised his eyebrows at Romelle and smiled as he spoke. “Not as sweet as you, Ro.”

Romelle’s cheeks turned pink and she crossed her arms over her chest. “Ro... I like that, Lance, and thank you, for calling me sweet, I mean.” She stumbled over her words and looked up at Lance, who flashed her his signature smile. Out of the corner of his eye, Lance saw Florona roll her eyes at him and stifle a laugh. He was tempted to call her out, but didn’t want to distract from Romelle.

“Well Ro, I’ve gotta head to class, but I’ll see you around.” Lance waved at her and her smile got even wider and her cheeks got even redder. “See ya Florona.”

She waved him off and turned back to Romelle, who was a blushing mess. “See you, loverboy.”

Lance continued down the hall to the staircase at the end. He took the steps slowly, giving himself time to think about what he would say if Keith were there. He actually probably wouldn’t say anything, now that he was thinking about it. He realized that one word from his mouth coupled with even a sideways glance from Keith would send him over the edge.

“I’ll just get to Kaminski’s class, hand him the pass, put in headphones, and that’s that. No need to deal with Keith, or my own damn self,” Lance muttered to himself as he reached the top of the staircase. Mr. Kaminski’s room was all of ten steps from the staircase, and Lance took every single one to psych himself up for what could possibly be the most anxiety wreaking class period of all time.

By step 7, he had turned down the miniature hallway that Kaminski’s class was at the end of. Lance looked at the door handle, contemplating going back down to the chorus room and just skipping class. Nobody had seen him outside the room, so he was a free man if he did just leave. Lance’s mind wandered back to the project that was due later that week though and didn’t want to risk missing any valuable time researching.

Lance held to both his backpack straps with a white knuckled grip, crumpling the pass Mr. Erikson has written him. He walked up to the solid door of the classroom and sucked in a breath as he grabbed the handle. The door opened with ease and he walked in, but no one turned a head to look at him. It was like he didn’t even open the door. Kaminski raised his head from his computer and motioned for Lance to put the pass he had held up in the air in the recycling bin. Lance watched the pass fall from his hand into the green bin at his feet and then headed to his seat. With a look around, he saw everyone working on their projects, most of them with headphones in.

Lance pulled his AP Euro notebook from his backpack and flipped to the page with his research on it. Some of the page had Keith’s writing on it, so he quickly scanned for where they left off on their research and flipped to a new page. Anything more than that with Keith and Lance thought he would explode.

As Lance opened up a tab on his phone to continue his research, he caught himself thinking about Keith, and the fact that he _knew_ he needed to properly apologize about what happened.

~~~

Lance left school in the transition between fifth period and lunch when he knew for certain there would be no administrators around. He’d gotten good at sneaking around campus without getting caught. Once he was in the student parking lot, he took out his phone and texted Pidge and Hunk in the group chat they’d made freshman year.

_hey guys, just wanted to let you know i’m gonna miss out on econ today. send me your notes?_

It barely took 10 seconds for Hunk to respond.

_What do you mean, you’re gonna miss econ? You were in chamber today!_

Pidge responded next, just as curious as Hunk had been.

_yeah, you were at school today. what happened? you feeling ok?_

Lance smiled, a warm feeling in his chest knowig that his friends cared about him. He smiled as he responded to both their texts.

_i’m just not feeling it today guys. i’m gonna go get shake pit for lunch and then go home. you’re welcome to join :)_

Lance got to his car and pressed the unlock button, throwing his backpack into the passenger seat of the car. He checked his phone one more time for any other texts from Pidge and Hunk before plopping down in the drivers seat and turning his car on. The stereo in his car started playing the album Danger Days by MCR, a band he had been listening to from the start. Bulletproof Heart started playing and he contemplated going back to the beginning of the album as he put his car in reverse and pulled out of his parking spot. When he shifted his car into drive he pressed the rewind button three times so the album would go back to Look Alive, Sunshine.

His white Toyota Camry that was second hand to him from his brother Luis bounced in the dip of the curb as he pulled out of the student parking lot. Other students had come out to the lot to leave for lunch, or to go to classes at SCF, the local community college. As Lance came up to Manatee Avenue to pull out and turn left, he reached to the volume dial on his car and cranked it as the first verse of Na Na Na started.

“Drugs, gimme drugs, gimme drugs! I don’t need it but I’ll sell what you got, take the cash and I’ll keep it, eight legs on the wall, hit the gas, kill them all! And we crawl, and we crawl! You be my detonator!” Lance’s singing was more like yelling, but somehow it was still beautiful. He made it so, and by the time cars had cleared so he could pull out onto Manatee Avenue for the short drive to Shake Pit the chorus came on and he was smiling from ear to ear.

Thanks to lunch-time traffic, what should’ve been a 2 minute drive to Shake Pit turned into a 10 minute drive, all because Lance had to wait to turn into the parking lot. While he was sitting and waiting for traffic to clear enough to cross the three lanes, he noticed what he had come to call the “vintage red piece of shit” that was Keith’s car. As soon as the opportunity presented itself, Lance hurried across traffic into the small parking lot of Shake Pit. The front of his car threatened to scrape against the dip in the road as he pulled into the lot, but Lance was able to stay slow enough to prevent it.

There were only a handful of people at Shake Pit at 12:08 on a Thursday afternoon. It was still early September, and the heat usually drove people away since almost all the seating was outside. It was also a bit too far from downtown for people to come on their lunch breaks, so it had turned into a place where high school kids who skip school for lunch, or just skip school in general, go to have a good burger.

As Lance pulled up, he saw Keith at a table by himself, his hair falling over in his face as he sat waiting for his burger. He had his hand on his cheek and, to Lance, looked rather sullen. Lance turned off his car, cutting off the rest of the Danger Days album that he loved so dearly. He watched Keith for a moment, toying with the idea of trying to apologize. A shaky hand ran through his hair, letting his bangs fall back in his face as he sighed. Other than clammy hands, a normal thing for Lance, he felt ok. He had recuperated from that morning and was about at 80%, considering what had happened.

Lance’s eyes trailed Keith as he got out of his car, keys in one hand and wallet in the other. Underneath Keith’s left hand, Lance could see a pencil moving furiously, he couldn’t tell what was coming from the pencil itself though, Keith’s body covered the notebook he was hunched over. Lance’s gaze stayed with Keith until he turned to the order window to get lunch.

“Hey, can I get a single cheese burger with lettuce, onion, ketchup and mayonnaise?” Lance smiled at the girl behind the window.

“Yeah, can I get a name for the order?”

“Lance,” he said. The girl turned away from Lance with a smile creeping on her face as she punched in his order and handed his ticket back into the kitchen. “That’ll be $6.47.”

“Oh, and can I get a diet coke too?” The girl nodded, adding it to the check. “You’re a doll.”

“$7.56, Lance.” Fishing through his wallet, he handed the girl $8 and smiled.

“Keep the change,” Lance said over his shoulder as he went to sit down with Keith.

Keith had headphones in and was oblivious to the fact that Lance had come to Shakepit, ordered, and was now sitting in front of him until his headphones were tugged out of his ears. Keith was about to yell at whoever it was, until he raised his head and saw the same boy with smooth, caramel skin, thick chocolate brown hair and deep, ocean blue eyes that he had yelled at this morning. Keith was silent, his mouth open just a bit. He had assumed Lance hated him, but Lance was following him around like a puppy. Lance’s eyes were expectant, but Keith didn’t want to say anything, in fear of hurting Lance. The pencil dropped from Keith’s hand, but Lance’s gaze didn’t move from Keith.

“Hey, uh, I didn’t expect to, uh, see you.” Keith closed the notebook that lay open on the table for the world to see.

“Yeah,” Lance shrugged, putting his chin in his hand. He looked over Keith. The afternoon sun cast harsh shadows across Keith’s angular face. “I’m heading home for the day and figured I’d get lunch. Saw you parked over there and figured I’d talk to you.”

“Talk to me about-” Keith was cut off by the girl at the pickup window who called Lance’s name.

“Hold that thought, Mullet,” Lance shot up from his seat and raced to the counter. The girl leaned out the window and handed Lace his burger and drink. She then went back into the kitchen and grabbed a mixer from the ice cream machine.

“This is for Keith,” she smiled at Lance and winked, bringing a subtle blush to Lance’s face. Lance took it from her and balanced it in the same hand as his soda. He looked at Keith for a good long while, wondering if the girl at the pick up window thought they were on a date. Heat rose into Lance’s cheeks as he began to realize it probably did look a lot like a date to any passer-by. Swallowing the lump of anxiety lodged in his throat, Lance headed back to what he could only call _their_ table.

Plopping down in his seat across from Keith, Lance shoved him his mixer. “Here,” he muttered, pulling his own burger from the bag.

“So, what exactly did you want to talk about?” Keith stirred his spoon to get all the peanut butter throughout the ice cream.

Lance took a sip of his soda and sighed. “Well, I wanted to apologize, but I don’t even know if you want one from me.” Keith raised an eyebrow at him and took a bite of his ice cream. “I was a real ass today. Like, a serious ass, and I’m sorry.” Keith’s eyes stayed trained on Lance, watching every detail of his face as he spoke. A light red had flushed his cheeks and his eyes darted around. “I guess just one sorry isn’t really enough, but it’s all I can really say, and I’m sorry that it’s all I can say, but what else am I supposed to say? ‘Hey Keith sorry for being a major ass, lemme just go throw myself off a bridge haha sorry again I’ll be going now.’ Like, no, that’s not an apology, that’s just rambling. I just-” Lance broke his train of thought for a split second to look up at Keith, who was still looking at him. Unlike other instances, their eyes held each other for a moment as Lance continued to speak.

“I’m really sorry, Keith. Are we cool?” Lance’s shoulders were raised and his eyebrows were knit together in worry as he waited for Keith to respond. The silence between them was deafening.

All Keith could do was stick out his Left hand, which held the cup with his mixer. “It’s peanut butter and chocolate,” he said, his eyes not leaving Lance’s. Inside, Keith was screaming at himself, what was he thinking? Lance couldn’t possibly think highly of Keith after that.

“Uh,” Lance grabbed Keith’s mixer. Lance’s heart was racing, thumping loud in his ears and sending a rush of excitement. Butterflies soared inside his chest as their hands brushed in the exchange. A small breath escaped his lips, he could feel Keith’s eyes following his movements. “Thanks, I guess?” He took a small bite of the mixer. Peanut butter and chocolate suddenly overwhelmed him and he couldn’t quite focus on anything that Keith was saying even though he knew that words were escaping his lips. A flash of heat washed over his body as he watched Keith’s mouth move and form words he couldn’t seem to comprehend. Curious eyes followed the shaking hand that rose to brush a stray lock of hair out of the way, revealing an ear with a handful of piercings as it was tucked away. Lance thought for a second and couldn’t recall ever seeing Keith with piercings. Then again, his mullet distracted from a lot of things.

“We’re cool, Lance,” was the first thing Lance heard Keith say out of everything he’d been talking about. Lance hadn’t realized he was still holding Keith’s mixer despite not having eaten any more. Shoving it back in his direction, Lance shot up from his seat, causing the table to wobble as he bumped into it.

“I’ve gotta go.” The words came from Lance’s mouth rushed and panicked.

Keith smiled at Lance gently. “You should come over to my place and hang out for a bit if you’re not busy. We can work on the Euro project that I kinda bailed on earlier today.”

“I wish I could, Mullet, but I have to take Maddie to ballet, sorry.” He put his burger back in the bag it came in and picked up his soda. His grip wobbled and his Diet Coke threatened to spill. Lance could only hope that Keith couldn’t see through his lie about his sister’s ballet rehearsal.

“But you didn’t even eat your burger, Lance.” Keith turned around in his seat to watch Lance racing back to his car. Again, Lance nearly dropped his soda. A brief wave was all Keith got as a goodbye, though he felt that there was more behind it than just that.

He checked his phone for the time, curious. _Lance’s sister can’t have ballet rehearsal, it’s only 12:42 on a school day._ Keith looked back to where Lance’s car had just been, his chest bubbling with a happiness he didn’t know he could feel.


End file.
